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Five and a bit years ago, when the Bank of England slashed interest rates to
0.5 per cent and began its quantitative easing programme, one of the newest
members of the Monetary Policy Committee cracked a joke.

Thank God he’d made it on to the committee by then, he told the other eight
members. Otherwise he’d never have had a chance to change interest rates at
all.

Well, it was intended as a joke: he, like the rest of them, realised that
borrowing costs would be low for some time.